FRYEBURG – Nearly 100 awards and scholarships were bestowed upon graduating seniors from Fryeburg Academy at two separate events over the weekend. The honors were distributed at the school’s class night Saturday and at commencement ceremonies Sunday.

Due to threatening weather, Sunday’s pomp was held in a large white tent in Peary Park that was packed to overflow capacity. The celebration began with an invocation by Rev. Ken Turley of Fryeburg New Church and welcoming words from Jenna Libbie Jackson, president of the class of 2004. This followed by a harmonious version of “The Star-Spangled Banner” sung by the school’s Select Chorus.

Featured speakers were Michael Daniel Griffin II, Brian Joseph Golino and Ryan Patrick Brown, three graduating seniors chosen by their peers to close their high school days with inspiring words.

Griffin, distinctive with a long brown ponytail and numerous facial piercings, quoted the rock band Lynard Skynard, saying, “I’m as free as a bird now.”

In a post ceremony interview, Griffin said he plans to go on to a school in Rhode Island to train for a career as a professional wrestler. He has already decided on his wrestling persona and plans to call himself Morbid. He also has his costume designed.

“Lots of spandex,” he said.

To his classmates he advised, “Keep safe, keep smart, and when your time comes, no regrets.”

A dark-haired Golino asked the crowd rhetorically, “Will this war ever end?”

“I’m petrified of what’s to come,” he said.

But he went on to remind his cohorts that “we are the class of 2004” and this, he said, will be his comfort in challenging times.

The archetypal yellow school bus served Brown, the final speaker, well in his journey through academia. But with his graduation from Fryeburg Academy, Brown was looking toward a new form of travel.

He spoke of his development at Fryeburg Academy, thanking his mentors and fellow graduates for helping him become who he is.

With a flair for irony and comic timing, Brown used the bus metaphorically, recalling his first day of kindergarten, clad in “a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles sweatshirt” and carrying a Ghostbusters lunchbox.

“I was a simpler boy then, not yet so learned in the ways of theater and public speakery,” he said of his arrival at the school and recalling a traumatizing attempt to give a speech in eighth grade. He had run away “like a little girl with a scraped knee,” he admitted.

Having counted the days of his school life, 2,267, to be exact, it was now time to say goodbye.

“It’s been a great trip, but it’s time to get off the FA bus and take that last leap off of the front yard of my life and onto a different bus,” he said.

“So, I’ll see you guys later because I have a bus to catch,” he concluded.

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